Each year, countless amounts of Florida fishermen find packages of marijuana, cocaine or illegal substances of similar fashion, sometimes worth millions, drifting at sea. Here is where they face one of the most tempting decisions of all: Call the Coast Guard, or chase the promise of riches, risking prison time — or, in some cases, bloodshed?
Some quickly turn in the catch and wash their hands of the unanticipated run-in. Others do the latter.
Here, in the many untold stories of drug smuggling off the Florida coast, lies dark truth of the drug-laden current of the Upper Keys.
Drugs have been washing ashore since the Caribbean and Latin America became a key transshipment point for marijuana (followed by cocaine) between the 50s and 70s.
No matter the outcome of each situation, one thing is certain: bales of drugs are still floating around the Keys, waiting to be discovered. And, in just two months last year, more than 400 pounds of weed washed up around the islands.
On Tuesday's show, we dove into the latest story in Miami New Times that uncovers the blood-curdling truth of exactly what the statements above claim.
The discovery of drug bales in open waters may appear to be the dark answer to a jackpot prayer for some. However, the handling of such packages is more dangerous than meets the eye. For lack of sparing the details, here is the read-like-a-movie plot published by the New Times — a 2015 murder more gruesome than worth the "high" stakes:
The three kids heard something in the night but figured mom was just arguing with her boyfriend Carlos. So they went back to sleep. Friday morning, 8-year-old Noah got up for school and awoke his siblings, 4-year-old Martha and 3-year-old Michael. Mom and Carlos still hadn't stirred, so he walked into their bedroom.
Then he saw them.
What to do? He didn't know. He touched the blood to make sure it was real. For a few hours, he and the others sat near the bed and sobbed. Their pit bull puppy wandered around, tracking tiny red paw prints through the house. Finally, Noah and his sister grabbed a sheet of paper and some crayons. They drew two headstones, both cross-shaped. On the bottom, they scrawled, "Rest in Peace, Mom and Carlos."
Rain poured on Key Largo. The water sluiced down Cuba Road, a sleepy block that dead-ends into Dove Sound, a mangrove-shaded inlet connected by canal to the Atlantic Ocean a few blocks away. Eventually, Noah made a decision: They'd have to find somewhere else to live. He grabbed his siblings, and they started walking up the sodden street.
Travis Kvadus, their next-door neighbor, rolled over in bed and checked the live feeds from the cameras he'd mounted in front of his house. The 33-year-old fisherman rubbed his eyes, confused. Why were the three kids he regularly babysat walking around in the rain?
He jogged out and opened the gate. The children rushed into his gravel-strewn front yard. "Mom and Carlos are dead," Noah told Kvadus.
"Are you sure?" he asked, still trying to wake up. "They're not just sleeping?"
"There was blood," Noah said.
CREDIT: Tim Elfrink, Miami New Times
This horror-movie like plot details the unfortunate true fate of 26-year-old Tara Rosado and her boyfriend, 30-year-old Carlos Ortiz.
According to original autopsy reports, Ortiz's blood tested positive for marijuana, morphine and Oxycodone. He had a substantial criminal record in Miami-Dade County on charges ranging from marijuana trafficking to armed robbery. He was found shot through the head.
He had recently teamed up with a group in the Keys drug circle to sell upwards of $500,000 of offshore cocaine in the local sphere. Although he made some money, Ortiz straggled with his own addictions. On the night before his murder, he allegedly divulged a plot to go to offshore drug-smugglers saying, "Either you guys give me... drugs and money, or I'm gonna go to the cops and tell them [you found drugs on the water]", according to the Miami New Times.
Rosado, who was also shot through the head and suffered her own, less severe drug problems, appears to be an innocent victim of the deadly drug ring.
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Unfortunately, this 2015 double murder is not the only fatal result of off-shore drug harvesting in the Florida Keys.
In just the past two years, at least 600 pounds (upward of $5 million worth) of drugs have been found by Florida fishermen and beach-goers, according to police and news reports gathered by Miami New Times.
Far more was surely found and resold on the black market without being reported.
This comes on the brink of the U.S. Coast Guard offloading upwards of 16 tons of cocaine seized in international waters over a 26-day period.